Why I would have made the perfect wife for Henry VIII

I make little clones of my husband, and they look like each other too.

The boys this weekend (Ben 22 months, Liam 3.5 years)

Liam wearing the same sweater at 19 months in the days after Ben was born:



Potty Training....in 3 days?

When Liam was a baby, I firmly believed in early potty training.  I bought Liam his blue Baby Bjorn potty for his first birthday.  We started putting him on it before baths sometime after the age of 1.  He wasn't much interested and I was tired and big and not wanting to wrestle 30 pounds of toddler.  Then Liam was about to turn 2....he was language delayed and Dave was about to deploy.  Potty training couldn't be further from my mind. Around age 2.5, I caught a few pees and even a poop or two.  Dave came home when Liam was 34 months and started working harder on potty training, but we were in the middle of the move from Alabama to Alaska.  After Liam turned 3, we all focused harder on pottying.  It was part of his IEP and he worked on pottying at preschool.  It is an OT goal and his OT therapist worked on the potty process.  His ABA therapist encouraged him.  Dave and I spent alot of time on the potty training.  At about 40 months old, Liam was 100% poop trained.  I am not sure he pooped in his pants at all in 2011. 

He had 6 days off of school, so I decided to try the three day method, fully expecting failure.  Our supplies were 5 pairs of Thomas underwear and Hershey's kisses.

Day 1, Liam had three accidents.

Day 2, he had 3 accidents again and the process wore him out so much, he crashed on the couch at 5pm.

Day 3, he had 2 accidents and stayed dry for a trip out of the house for lunch and errands.  That night, he spent an hour puking--all over his bed, in the toilet, and then into a bucket in his room.  Fun times indeed.

Day 4, he was totally dry.

I am more shocked than I can express!

Schedules, Flexibility, and Balance

I have gotten to yoga once in 2011, but am getting e-mails from my yoga teacher.  She wants us to pick a wword forthe year and really focus on it.  I searched all January for a word.  I used searching as a word as an excuse not to go to yoga. It came to me this week: balance.  Right now, my life has no balance, although in reality I have always struggled with balance.  I tend to approach things full force, leaving little time for balance.  It is an on-going struggle and ties in to the rest of the post  below.

Schedules are important in our house.  I have always liked schedules.  I scheduled our honeymoon and many of our European trips (yes, I know everyone thinks that is funny but it is practical!).  Dave like felxibility so my schedules always usually included large blocks of open ended time for Dave.  After Liam was born, schedules went out the window.  Liam wanted to eat and sleep at will and I wanted peace in the household.  I was still in the midst of  this with Ben when Liam was diagnosed and Dave deployed and suddenly schedules became important again.

For a kid on the autism spectrum, schedules are vital.  Liam has alot of anxiety and it is partly managed by knowing what to expect.  All kids are like this, but Liam, like others on the spectrum, does not have the extra emotional resources to manage his reactions to things being thrown off schedule.  Liam has been in a tailspin since Christmas break and has not been able to snap out of it.  I am watching him backslide and feel helpless as meltdowns and tantrums sneak back into our lives.  In addition, his ABA tutor had a baby last week.  He has a new tutor but with winter viruses swirling around and the change in tutors, he has had alot of cancelled therapy.

Liam attends special education preschool 5 days a week for 2 hours each day.  His travel time on the bus is 30 minutes a day; I spend about 10-20 minutes a day waiting for the bus as it's timing depends on road conditions.  This means his school day takes up nearly 3 hours, but I only have just over 2 hours to b out of the house before I need to be back home to meet Liam's bus.  Liam does ABA 3 hours a day, 4 days a week.  He does speech and OT once a week but that is a 45 minute drive away so it takes a 3 hour block of time.  This means 30 hours a week are scheduled for Liam's therapy.  Ben does Early Intervention 1 hour a week.  He has visiting the chiropractor twice a week, and again that invbolves a 45 minute drive each way so it is a 2.5 hour commitment.  In between those nearly 35 hours a week is our free time to hopefully nap, schedule playdates, see friends, run errands, cook meals, and maybe even have free time to play.

So, when I am asked to be flexible, it can be hard.  Or when the house cleaner scheduled to come at 10am, but arriving sometime after 11:20am finds herself waiting outside in 16 degree weather, because I only had from 11:20pm to 12pm to run to the store to pick up some dinner for tonight.

This post started about balance.....clearly, we are in desparate need.

Nap Nightmares

Sleep has always been a battle for us.

It was a battle with Liam.  Liam didn't nap out of my arms until he was 4 months old.  Then he didn't nap longer than 30 minutes until he was nearly 9 months old.  Then before Ben was born, sometime around Liam turing 18 months, he started to take 3 hours to fall asleep for a nap and would wake up and scream for 30-60 minutes.  He stopped napping reliably sometime shortly after Ben was born.  He'd nap for a couple weeks then would refuse a nap for 3 months straight.  He generally went into his room for a nap okay and would stay there for 1 hour or so.  I gave up trying when he turned 3 and both of us are happier now. 

Liam's nighttime sleep was no better.  When he was a newborn, sleep seemed promising.  He only woke every 2-3 hours and went right back to sleep.  Then he started to spread out his feedings.  By 2 months, he was reliably going about 7-8 hours at night.  Right before 4 months, he slept 12 hours straight twice.  Then he turned 4 months, and didn't sleep through the night again for 8 months.  Between 4 months and 12 months, we'd be inj his room as often as 12 times a night.  Usually from 8-10pm, we were in there 4-6 times.  Then from 10pm until 6am, we were in there once every 90 minutes or so.  At 12 months, he started sleeping through the night, but it was short lived.  During my pregnancy with Ben, he'd wake at night and play alone in his crib for 2-3 hours.  He didn't need us to get him back to sleep, but he was only sleeping 6-8 hours at night (and remember naps were a struggle).  Sometime around 2.5, he started sleeping through the night.  Now he gets about 10 hours of sleep a night.

If I thought Liam's sleep was bad, I was in for a rude awakening with Ben.  Ben never napped.  Until about 6 months old, his "naps" consisted of 5-15 snoozes.  By 7 months old, he was actually napping but only took one nap a day.  Since about 15 months, he'll only nap about 3 or 4 times a week and often then only for 30 to 60 minutes.  But he doesn't lay in his crib, he screams.  If Dave is home and rocks him, he falls asleep, but he simply won't sleep for me.  If you have followed my blog, you know that Ben didn't sleep at night.  Unlike Liam, he didn't want to nurse, he just wanted to scream in pain.  He was up from 1am until 3 or 4am most nights and often up for the day between 4 and 5am.  When we maxed out his Prilosec dosage, he began sleeping through the night.  He also sleeps about 10 hours a day.  If he does nap, he screams for 1-2 hours after waking up.  If he doesn't nap, he requires me to hold him non-stop from 3pm until he goes to beed, often crying and repeating "walk walk" and screaming if I don't comply.

Today he fell asleep with his white noise machine on full blast.  Sammy was on another floor of the house and meowed and Ben woke up demanded "kitty" and despite rocking, nursing, and being left alone will not fall back to sleep.  My back has been in screaming agony for a week.  I cannot stand straight.  I need Ben to rest so I can get a break from carrying  him.  I am so tired of the nap battles.  I have struggled for 3 and half years trying to find peace with my sleep situation and it hasn't happened.  If Ben doesn't nap, I am punished with listening to him randomly scream for the rest of the day, and if he does I need to spend 2-3 hour rocking, nursing, shushing to get him to sleep, and then to keep him asleep I need to make sure Liam doeesn't talk, no cats meow, no one calls the house, no one flushes a toilet, no one uses any appliances, and no one watches TV or listens to any music....and then I get 45 minutes of "peace."  There has GOT to be a better way.

So, apparently number 5 is optional

At least to Ben.  I got him counting on video as he is obsessed with it.  He has decided that number 5 is over-rated and skips straight to 6 after 4.  Still, not to shabby.

Here is another video.  This one shows Ben counting.  Liam joins in.   It also illustrates how jealous Ben gets when the attention is turned towards Liam.  I think that is why he learned to count; he is competetive and does't want Liam doing anything he can't do.  Sigh......

a budding friendship

Liam loves Murray and Sammy, but is a bit loud and unpredictable for their taste.  Ben is not nearly as gentle as Liam is, but despite that, Murray really seems to like Ben.  With Ben feeling under the weather, Murray let him have some kitty cuddle time (which in my opinion is the best medicine).

Ten

That's how high Ben can count at not quite 22 months.  I'll try to get it on video but he won't do it on command.  I was really surprised that Ben knew how to count.  I thought Liam only learned to count so young because of his obsession over numbers and being on the autism spectrum.

Of course, Ben tries my patience.....alot.....so I need to coount to 10, alot to calm myself down.

Here he is after eating one of Liam's art projects (not eating exactly, but more licking marker ink off of it).

And with his recent interest in the fridge phonics, he'll start recognizing letters too.  He already recognizes some while playing "Monkey Lunchbox" on my iTouch.